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Nov 21
Love0

My cob building in The Bund magazine of Shanghai

By Uncategorized, Resources

the bund - cob cover

I was surprised to receive a comment on my blog from a foreign reader a couple of months ago. It was from The Bund magazine of Shanghai, and they were interested in doing an interview about building my cob house. Needless to say, I was immediately interested. Surprised, too, of course.

Anyway, I just got a copy of the magazine in the mail the other day. It’s a large format weekly magazine, very glossy, very westernized. Smack dab in the middle of high fashion and pop culture is the article about my cob building, with a photo of me (see above) sitting in my (unfinished) little mud house in a dirty t-shirt. Pretty hilarious. (And opposite that photo? An advertisement picturing Jackie Chan. Trippy.)

Fun stuff.

Here is a PDF document of the article: Cob building interview in The Bund

Nov 18
Love0

Still here, but almost done for the year

By Uncategorized

When all of your energy comes from the sun, and the sun don’t shine for a week, that means there ain’t no power to keep this blog updated.

So. Anyway. Building is definitely winding down and pretty much done for the season. I will put up a few more entries detailing the last of my cob building exploits for the year, and then I will slowly enter hibernation mode.

I would like to keep this blog rolling in the off season, so I am considering creative ways of keeping relevant and fresh content coming even while I’m not working on my house. We shall see.

Nevertheless, expect a little bit about my earthen plastering experience and winterproofing the house in the near future.

Nov 03
Love0

Starting to build the earthen mass floor

By Earthen Floor

And now… how to build an earthen floor:

When I began building, I decided to leave the topsoil in my house instead of hauling it out. I guess mostly to avoid the extra labor, really.

floor-dirt

Over the months, it has become quite tamped and solid from continually walking on it. I decided to leave it as is, with the original slope of the land, supposing that any moisture that does happen to get in there (which it shouldn’t) will run out towards the drainage trench.

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Nov 03
Love0

Getting in the last building work before winter

By Earthen Floor, Living Sod Roof

I will be headed out of Dancing Rabbit in three short weeks to go back to New Jersey for the holidays. Within the past couple of weeks, I have accepted the fact that I will not absolutely “finish” the house before that time. By “finish”, I mean complete the roof, finish the floor, make my rocket stove and cob bed and bench, and plaster the interior.

So. I’ve done some prioritizing. Now that the cob walls are complete, and the windows and door are in, the house is sealed. My biggest remaining priority is the roof – I need to construct an edge board around the roof, create a soil-retaining system, and have soil moved to my site and load it onto the roof. Oh, and seed the soil, too. That’s not a small load of work by any means!

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Nov 02
Love0

Late October cob building photo update

By Uncategorized

Here are some photos from the past couple of weeks:


Finishing the cob walls – it was very tight having to work so closely to the roof.


Installing windows – all of the windows I purchased were some kind of replacement windows – they all had a vinyl exterior trim which we screwed into the window frames.

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Oct 30
Love0

Cob walls complete, windows and door installed, and more!

By Earthen Floor, Cob Building, Living Sod Roof, Clay Plaster

The past week or so has been quite eventful. There’s been mostly positive progress, but some negative, too.

Cobbing complete!

With Karen’s and my dad’s help, I completed cobbing. The walls are finally done! In just a few days, the gap between the walls and the roof was closed. It was very satisfying to see the final line of the wall meet the decking of the roof. It was awkward work having to stuff the small spaces, but it wasn’t too bad…

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Oct 19
Love0

Dressing up the reciprocal roof

By Living Sod Roof, Reciprocal Roof

muslin-under

Before the EPDM went on the roof, I wanted to add a cushion of cardboard on top of the rafters and decking to protect the membrane. And before the cardboard went on, I wanted to add some kind of fabric so that the cardboard would not be visible from inside of the space. I bought a 50 yard bolt of muslin for $50 at Zimmerman’s, and Karen (my current work exchanger) and I draped the fabric and stapled it to the decking.

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Oct 19
Love0

Making a tractor tire skylight frame

By Reciprocal Roof

tire-lift

A few nights ago, a flash of brilliance struck during a conversation after dinner about making a frame for a future skylight in my reciprocal roof. We were sitting around, thinking of alternatives to making a wood frame, which would have proved quite difficult considering the irregular nature (14 uneven round poles) of the top of the roof.

And then someone mentioned a tire. And then I remembered the huge tractor tires we have lying around on the property, and amazingly enough, the dimensions were nearly perfect: a five foot diameter tire with a three foot diameter hole, perfect for the 4.5 foot diameter rafter ring, and 3.5 foot diameter hole in the roof.

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